film

As last mentioned, we’ve reached a place where an adjustment of our outline is in order.

The outline calls for another day at the cabin before the creatures are fully revealed. A day of further development of the character arcs, a ratcheting of tensions between them, some flashback scenes with the crazy old lady (illuminating her back story).

But as the story has developed to this point, there’s been plenty of organic evolution in the characters and their relationships… in other words, the characters needed to say some things and we let them say them. We allowed them to find their own paths, rather than forcing the outline on them. Consequently, although we’re essentially on task as per the story outline, the characters’ awareness of events, and their natural revealing of their subtexts, are further along than anticipated.

And that’s great. It means we’ve allowed the characters to develop naturally. And, it means we’re ready to really hit the big reveals, get the blood and panic flowing, and start the real juggernaut through the second act (which we’re both looking forward to).

So, today we met to review what that “fourth day” in the woods was going to offer, choose which of its story points we can live without, and which story points we must have. We were able to lose about half of what that day was going to deliver. Those things we must have, we found new homes for by folding them (elegantly) into previous scenes.

That means we’re able to get to the (horror) meat sooner. *

And our pacing will be better.

And we’ll be ahead of our outline as regards page count.

So, here’s where we are.

Page 40. Outline says we should be at about 42.

Hours (chip): 44.5**

* Lest one be concerned that we’re not getting to the “horror meat” soon enough (we’re on page 40!) we’re building something that’s akin to “The Descent“. I looked at that film again just the other day. The first time we see the creatures in the cavern, we’re at minute 50. We’ll beat that.

** Hours are approximate. It’s just my hours. Sean probably has about as many, maybe a few more. So our total man hours may be around 100 (just to keep numbers round). This INCLUDES the hours spent building the ten page outline. That means we’re averaging a page every 2.5 hours. Crazy. This process is proving very efficient (provided the quality is not compromised. From where we’re sitting, it’s not).

Went back and added a scene… we’d had the discovery of the hidden darkroom happen off screen, but decided that was a lame move. We need to see that happen… the secret door, the creepiness of the first entry into the old root cellar. So now we do, thanks to the new scene. And we took it as an opportunity to further define the back story on our writer character, and demonstrate his strong friendship with his buddy’s wife.

Then moved on into a scene where his buddy’s secret plans for the cabin are further revealed.

The past two days have been tough writing days… scenes with more subtlety, that require a certain amount of exposition of information without writing expository dialogue. Definitely the toughest two days so far.

It’s possible that we need to contract our story’s time line by one day… it feels like we’re ready to move into the action sequences, but on the outline, there’s still another day’s worth of discovery and character revelation yet to handle. The pacing to this point feels like we’re past most of that, and ready to go on to some faster, more action oriented scenes.

We’ll decide in our next session whether we can excise that day, just reveal the creatures in all their glory, and start the juggernaut of action and blood and dying and whatnot.

We tried something new today… Sean stayed home, and we both logged into Zhura, while talking on the phone. Worked pretty well. Still not as satisfying as being in the same room together, but all in all a successful round.

We got 5 pages done today. We’ve had a sweaty round of hot monkey sex in the woods (boobies for the genre purists), found a pile of bones on the roof, and stumbled across the creepy hidden darkroom in the root cellar.

God, I hope it reads as good as that just sounded!

Probably no work again till Thursday.

We’re up to page 33. That makes us about 7 pages long I think. Ouch. But we’re not worried yet. We can trim that down in our next draft. Right now, focus on getting done.

Acting class today. Had a scene from True Crime, in which I played Eastwood’s part, Steve Everett. Had the script for a week or more to work the lines, but only practiced with my partner Chelsea in the hallway for 20 minutes. Nevertheless, we (as Randy Jackson would say) “worked it out, dog.” Scene came off really well. Ralph said he was impressed with us and that he really believed my character lived in that bar… “no hobbies, no friends, just his car out front and drinkin’.”

But it’s true… I felt the difference. This thing actors do (real actors, not me) is hard work. Till today I always felt self-conscious, not really listening to the other person between my lines… I was (cue John Lovitz) “ACTING!”